


Trinkets

by Andromache_42



Series: SPN Advent Calendar 2019 [1]
Category: Supernatural
Genre: Canon Universe, Human!Castiel - Freeform, M/M, Mild Angst, Pre-Slash, Set sometime post-canon, Writing Challenges
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-03
Updated: 2019-12-03
Packaged: 2021-02-26 00:13:47
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,140
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21654319
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Andromache_42/pseuds/Andromache_42
Summary: When Cas finally falls for real, for good, for the last time, he suddenly develops a need to collect things. At first, it doesn’t seem like there is any kind of a pattern to the collection, but over time Cas finds himself drawn to small, shiny things. Sam calls it his “magpie tendencies.” It amuses Cas to think of himself as a bird, building a nest in his own little corner of the Bunker. He arranges his collection carefully on the shelves behind his bed, reorganizing things from time to time as the mood strikes him.Written for Supernatural Advent Calendar 2019Day 1: Snow Globe
Relationships: Castiel/Dean Winchester
Series: SPN Advent Calendar 2019 [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1561129
Comments: 2
Kudos: 47





	Trinkets

When Cas finally falls for real, for good, for the last time, he suddenly develops a need to _collect_ things. At first, it doesn’t seem like there is any kind of a pattern to the collection, but over time Cas finds himself drawn to small, shiny things. Sam calls it his “magpie tendencies.” It amuses Cas to think of himself as a bird, building a nest in his own little corner of the Bunker. He arranges his collection carefully on the shelves behind his bed, reorganizing things from time to time as the mood strikes him.

The collection is eclectic, some small trinkets from truck stop gift shops, souvenirs from roadside tourist traps. There’s a tiny pencil from the first time he, Claire, and Dean went miniature golfing, a particularly appealing pine cone from a park where he sometimes goes with Sam when he goes for a run. Nothing expensive, or useful, but while he’s finding it more difficult to recall events from his long memory as an angel, he remembers the circumstances around every one of his items.

“Hey, got a case.”

Cas finishes adjusting several novelty license plate keychains on their pegs before turning to face Dean.

“Are you sure I can handle it?” Cas asks flatly.

“Seriously? Wouldn’t have asked if I didn’t. It’s a milk run. Back a bag, let’s go.”

“No, I don’t think so.”

Dean stops mid-step and turns back toward Cas. “You got something better to do?” Dean scoffs.

“Yes, actually.” Dean looks taken aback.

“What, hang out in here with your junk collection? Cas you haven’t left this room in days.”

Cas seethes. “That’s not true. I went to the park with Sam—”

“Dude, that was last week. C’mon, Sammy’s packing up the car, I’ll meet you in the garage.”

“ _Dean_ ,” Cas practically growls. “I’m not going.”

His fingers absently trace the bandage still wrapped around his wrist, and when he sees Dean’s eyes flick toward it, he tugs his sleeve down roughly. Something dark flashes over Dean’s features before he schools them again. “We’re leaving in ten,” he says, and then stalks off down the hall.

Cas fights for a while against the instinct to follow Dean down the hall, to comply with his orders and join them. But since he’s fallen, really become human, the close calls have gotten closer and closer . . . and, anyway, Cas doesn’t want to spend another endless stretch of days trapped in the car with the Winchesters.

A bit of snow falls on the third day after the Winchesters leave, so Cas spends the afternoon sweeping snow from the steps outside of the Bunker’s front door. As the calendar flips closer to the end of the year, the chill of a prairie winter steals into Lebanon and Cas bundles up in the flannels and thick canvas jackets favored by hunters. Still, it doesn’t do much to make him feel like one.

On the fourth day, Dean calls for help with research, which Cas is all too happy to do. Dean’s voice is clipped over the phone, but they manage to make it through a conversation without it making Cas want to scream, so he counts it as a win.

All told, it takes about a week for Sam and Dean to return from their hunt. It turns out to be a vampire nest, which makes Cas clutch compulsively at his still-bandaged wrist and sends a shiver of dread down his spine.

He’s rearranging his collection again when he hears the brothers stomp down the hallway. Dean passes by his room, grumbling under his breath, something about the changing weather. Cas wonders if maybe he should ask about decorating the Bunker for the holidays. It might give him something else to do here.

“Hey.”

Cas takes a deep breath before he turns around. “How are you, Dean?” he asks. Dean shifts his weight, hands in his pockets.

“I’m good. Same old, same old, you know?”

No, Cas isn’t familiar, as the deep gashes hidden under his bandage tell. He scratches at it subconsciously.

“Oh, shit, we gotta change those,” Dean says, and before Cas can protest, Dean is hurrying off and shuffling back with his medical kit. He goes willingly as Dean sits on the bed next to him and digs out disinfectant and bandages.

“Do you think we should decorate for the holidays?” Cas asks to distract himself as Dean’s gentle fingers remove his bandage and probe at the wound.

“It’s healing pretty good,” Dean says, mostly to himself, before swiping a gauze pad soaked in Bactine over the vampire’s teeth marks. The wound had nicked an artery, and bled profusely, though it wasn’t enough to warrant stitches. Dean’s face had been as white as Cas’s as he and Sam bundled Cas into the car, slowly growing woozy on their way back to the motel. He’d passed out briefly before he woke up again on the scratchy comforter, Dean wrapping his wrist tightly in gauze.

“Dean, what do you think?” Cas repeats as Dean carefully re-wraps his arm.

“I think you’ll live,” Dean says, patting Cas’s wrist before pulling away awkwardly. Cas nods sharply.

“Right.”

Silence stretches long between them, seated together on Cas’s bed. Cas fidgets with a loose end of the gauze, watching Dean’s hands turn the roll of medical tape over in his fingers.

“I, uh, got something for you,” Dean says at long last. Cas lifts his head in question while Dean fishes in his pockets. “Thought you could put it in your collection.”

Dean holds out his fist, and in the middle is a tiny, miniature plastic snow globe. Cas takes it gingerly from Dean’s hand and holds it up close to his face. Inside is a single evergreen tree, decorated with colorful bulbs, and when he shakes it a cloud of glitter kicks up, sparkling as it drifts back down.

“Thank you,” Cas says genuinely. Dean smiles a little.

“You’re welcome.”

Cas shakes the snow globe one more time before standing and placing it at the far end of his collection next to a strip of photo booth prints featuring him and Dean.

“Cas . . .” Dean starts, then pauses. “Missed you on the hunt. Should come with us next time.”

Cas hums thoughtfully. “Maybe,” he says.

Dean wants to say something more, Cas can tell, but after another long stretch of silence he finally just says, “If you wanna decorate for Christmas, go nuts,” before rushing out of the room. The knot in Cas’s stomach doesn’t disappear with him, though.

Cas still isn’t used to being human, not yet, but there are some things he’s already begun to appreciate. He gently nudges the snow globe so it rests a little closer to the pictures of him and Dean together and thinks that, maybe, it will just take some getting used to.


End file.
